


Lovesick

by Kat_Of_Dresden



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, Doctor/Patient, F/M, Hospital
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-20
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-21 23:23:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2486021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kat_Of_Dresden/pseuds/Kat_Of_Dresden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ouat Hospital AU. Emma Swan has transferred to Storybrooke memorial, a very peculiar centre where everyone is in love. Everyone except for her, competent cardiologist Dr. French and Ruby Lucas, the intern. But even they may fall victims of the worst disease... Love. Eventual Captain Swan, Rumbelle and Frankenwolf.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

"Really?" Emma Swan, newcomer Emergencies doctor in Storybrooke memorial hospital, couldn't believe the place she was working on. It was ridiculous, really, not to mention unprofesional. It was unbelieveable.

All the couples.

Couples everywhere.

So many of them.

There were doctors flirting, doctors kissing, nurses having dates, flowers everywhere, patient doctor relationships... and was that the receptionist with one of the janitors? Seriously, it was worse than a Grey's anantomy episode. Hell, it was worse than a Grey's anatomy _season._ This was supposed to be a workplace, a place for professionals, and looked more like a dating service than a medical centre.

When she came from Boston she thought things would be more normal, in a small town like that, that maybe she would get away from the crazy haze that was Boston. people would be... Wouldn't be... like romance novel characters.

Luckily, Emma met Ruby, a spunky first year intern intern awho she seemed alone and unattached. Fortunately, she was. Dr. Swan told her about how weird it all seemed to her, all the kisses in the hospital beds, all the longing looks from patients. The cards, the cuddling - it was uncanny.

"And you haven't seen Mary Margaret with the coma guy!" Ruby said, after laughing at Emma's observations. "She reads him fairy tales and stuff."

"Mary M... that's my flatmate!" Emma said, horrified. She had seemed a normal person! A pediatric nurse with a spare room who liked kids and pastel colored skirt! What!

"And she's in love with a coma guy." Ruby assesed.

"Are we the only ones still sane in this hospital, Ruby?"

"You mean, not lovesick?" Emma nodded. "Well, there's Belle too. Dr. French, the cardiologist? But I think that's it. Oh, and Dr. Whale, my resident. He's a pretty lonely man."

And the rest of them, dozens of people, even administrative people had found love in their workplace. It wasn't simply odd that all these people were in relationships, it was that they'd found their significant others inside the hospital. A place people usually hated, where they suffered, a place that people usually wanted to get ou of the sooner the better. Well, here, they fell in love. All of them but four. The last survivors.

Emma still had a hard time believing it.

"That's four people in the whole hospital - that's..."

Impossible, she wanted to say. It was as if some sort of magical love-curse was running around in the hospital.

"One of our cleaning ladies, Ashley, met her boyfriend here too. They have a baby girl now." Ruby added.

"This is insane."

"I know."

"It's the hospital of love." Emma said, disbelieving. What kind of place had she transfered to?

"Worst disease of all."

"Preach it, doctor. Worst disease of all indeed." A third voice joined them from behind. It was Doctor French, who'd been working there for years and was glad to have someone with who she could comment on this.

Ruby was very young and Dr. Swan had only transfered a while ago, so all she'd had up to now were lovey-dovey couples and gloomy Dr. Whale. Good man, but he seemed... haunted. It was nice to have some fresh blood in the hospital.

They became friends easily, the three women. Ruby took note of what the other two did - they were experienced doctors and she was just starting. She knew things from college and from her grandma, who had taught her so much, but still. Belle and Emma were strong, smart, independent, reliable, wise. They were what she dreamed of being, what she dreamed of becoming.

Emma too was happy of having found these girls. Sure, Mary Margaret was a very nice woman and she enjoyed spending time with her new-found son, but they were both so...lovely. So sugary and nice - while she'd been quite the opposite for a big part of her life. Her colleagues, those ladies weren't simply nice and lovely. Ruby was fierce and Belle was incredibly clever and they were both really interesting women.

And they seemed to be immune to the love sickness that was going around the hospital, for some reason.

Until that fateful tuesday, that is.

When Belle had to treat an older man with a limp that had been stabbed near the heart.

The same day Ruby went looking for Dr. Whale, who had disappeared in the middle of a shift.

The same day Emma had to treat a hit and run victim with several broken ribs and a missing hand.

It all changed that day.

A/N: Reviews are always welcome!


	2. Hurting

It had been a long time since Belle had performed such a delicate operation. The man assigned to her had come in an almost critical condition after sustaining a stabbing in an area near the heart, and she had to stich up some tears, clean the area and repair as much damage as possible. A challenge, yes, but one she had no problem taking up. Surgeries were a very delicate thing, but she knew how to be delicate. And this man was going to be good as new when she finished.

Still, there was a lot of data missing from his file, so she hoped there wasn't any unknown strange allergy. There wasn't even a first name listed, only an initial - R. Gold. Belle wondered what the name of the man was, she liked to know the person she was treating, the details. Richard? Robert? Raymond? Russell? But now was not the time for that. Now was the time to focus on the injury and on the matter at hand. She prepared for surgery and the team was already there - nurses, the anesthetist... and the unfortunate victim.

"I'm going to call you Ruben." Belle decided. She felt that it was something with a U in it.

She spent three hours in there, performing the surgery and thankfully everything went right, things went as soothly as possible. (There was strange yellowish fluid that bothered her a bit, but she drained it and continued and it gave no further problems). And then, when the operation was almost over and she was closing already, the patient (the heavily sedated patient who was undergoing major surgery) opened his eyes and looked at her. Belle stopped, the instrument in her hand nearly falling.

"How...?"

"Belle." He whispered and immediately after slipped back to unconsciousness.

One of the nurses looked at her.

"Do you know this man, Dr. French?"

Belle was stunned. That man who just had open heart surgery, who was supposed to be out, who had so many drugs in his system and a literal hole in his heart had looked at her and said her name. As if he knew her. As if somehow she was the most important person in the world.

"So you saw that too. How is that possible?" She was just there standing for a moment, unable to move. But she had soemthing to finish. She continued closing and ordered to increase the sedatives. Just in case.

What a strange incident. He'd looked at her so intensely - like he knew her. But she hand't met this man, right? Where could she had met him? She couldn't shake the thought of him, looking at her, saying her name, even after the surgery.

"Just who exactly are you, Ruben?" She wondered aloud.

She would examine this man closely. A nice mystery to be uncovered.

* * *

Ruby was going up in the lift to the roof. She'd been ordered to look for Doctor Whale (he had a surgery scheduled and was nowhere to be seen) and she knew that sometimes he liked to go up there. Sometimes she wished she had a different resident like sexy beardy Dr. Humbert or even Dr. Kathryn Nolan, who maybe could her get in the good graces of the director of the hospital, Regina Mills. Not that she could complain much about Doctor Whale, he had taught her a lot and was nice and kind and had a loooot of patience with the families of the patients, but still.

She would have enjoyed having someone more cheerful by her side, like Emma. She was fun.

He was there just as she had imagined (or was it a hunch that she had? Somehow she had felt the man was there) but he was too close to ledge. There was something scary about his position, something dangerous.

"Dr. Whale?" She called and started moving towards him.

"Don't come near me!" He said. There was a silent determination in his eyes that Ruby has never seen before.

And it that moment she knows it. He was going to jump and she was going to have to stop him. She would have to be quick and take him before he fell. So she ran and he let go, ready to fall into the void.

But something caught him. No, not something, someone. It was Ruby and she somehow managed to get him on the floor of the rooftop. Impossible strength, that girl had.

"What the hell were you doing?" She yelled at him, panting.

He didn't answer. His blue eyes were full of emotion, anger, grief, frustration. Ruby hadn't realised how expressive they were before. Her pager was beeping. She shut it.

"Hey." She said to her resident and knew that this was an important personal and wished she knew his first name but she didn't nd how weird is that - did she really care so little about the man that she hadn't even bothered to get his name? "Why would you do that?"

"I... I don't want to talk about it."

Well, she was having none of that. She had just saved his life, she deserved at least an explanation.

"Either you talk to me or you talk to the people at the psych ward. So, talk to me."

They sat in half comportable position on the rooftop floor, facing each other. Whale's eyes were bright and Ruby wondered how no one had seen how depressed this man was. How close to the edge. Not even her.

"I'm tired, Ruby." He admitted. "I can't get over what I did... I... It follows me, I'm reminded every day..."

There had been a terrible incident in which his brother got shot and Whale lost him on the operation table and then brought him back. But not at all - the brother had brain damage, could hardly speak. He was now in a special needs facility, with 24 hour care. It was a terrible sight.

"No one blames you for your brother." Ruby said, because it was true. He'd done all he could, the same any other Doctor would.

"Our father did." Whale mentioned, looking at the floor, unable to look at her.

"Well, your father was an idiot. Look, we've all got things we regret, things that haunt us.... but we can't let them stop us. We have to move past the darkness and enjoy this new chance at life that is presented every day." Ruby said, surprising even herself. Who knew she was so good at pep-talk?

"I don't know if I can... move past it."

"But you do it every day! You save lives for a living! And you put up with all those angry relatives - and with me! You're awesome!"

He let out a little laugh.

"I don't feel awesome."

"We should change that, then. Say, why don't you go, do that surgery you have now, finish the rest of the shift and then meet me in the bar to get wasted and feel great. You tell me about the shit you'd rahter not remember and I tell you about mine." Ok, so maybe she was doing it because she felt bad for him, but it actually sounded like a great plan.

"I don't want you spending time with me out of pity." He said.

"It's not that, I promise. Hey, I get only, too, all surrounded by couples." She smiled. "Come on, now. First round's on me."

That seemed to do the trick. They got up and went to the lift, to go back to work.

"In all this time" Ruby started in the elevator, a bit awkward "I don't think I ever got your..."

"Victor." He said, as if reading her mind."You can call me Victor."

* * *

Emma was looking at the vitals of this guy, concerned. Something was wrong, something that she couldn't explain. There were too many symptoms that were unrelated to the trauma with the car, but could worsen his delicate condition. Killian Jones, from Ireland. He was missing a hand but there was no record of how or when he lost it. No records of him visiting any doctor in the last seven years either, which was odd.

Nothing that would explain the elevated blood pressure, the low oxygen or the excessive potassium. No reason at all. Which meant he was going to have to talk to this guy. It would also be interesting to know what was he doing in the states, and walking on a road at night. Anything that would give her a clue to what was going on.

She entered the room, where the patient was looking at the window. Emma wondered where he'd gotten all those scars (some more visible, others almost too tiny to be noticed) and how on earth did he lose that hand.

"Mr. Jones? I'm your Doctor, Emma Swan. I need you to ask you some questions."

"Well then, ask away." He said in an accented voice. He was clearly in pain, but trying to hide it. Maybe she should up the painkillers.

"Are you taking any medication?"

"No."

"Any significant sicknesses on the last year?"

"No."

"Last five years?"

"Aye" he said, as who the hell says aye nowadays "Couple of years ago, had a bit of a chest infection. You see, I travel by ship very often, it gets cold sometimes."

Interesting data. Emma wrote it down to look for sea-related ailments.

"Ok, chest infection, what kind? Pneumonia? Bronchitis?"

Jones just shook his head, checking her over

"I don't know exactly. I did cough a lot, if it helps." He moved around the bed, uncomfortable. "And why does my chest hurt so much now, if I may ask?"

"You broke a few ribs, it will take time to heal. Now, about the accident... you with me, Mr. Jones?" She asked, noticing how his eyes had gotten a bit unfocused. She should probably not strain him too much, he was recovering from a multiple traumatism after all.

"Where else would I be, Swan?" He threw her a naughty little smile.

Emma rolled her eyes. And then someone knocked on the glass door of the room before she could ask another question.

"Oh, the police. They're probably here to have your statement of the accident. I'll be back later, Mr. Jones."

"Please, call me Hook."

"Hook?"

"Like the Captain."

He smiled and she couldn't help smiling back. He had...spark, this guy. And he was a mystery. What had happened to the hand? Why did he spend time on a ship even when he got ill? Why on earth did he say _aye_ and not yes? Intriguing man, this Hook.

When their shifts ended, Belle, Ruby and Emma commented the peculiar day they all had.

Something was changing.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed! Please review!

 


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